in memory of the deez

For everything there is a season. We’ve been over that before, but how easily I forget that when times get a little rough and I just want them to be easy.

On Monday, January 28, my good friend Anthony Smith passed away, just a day before his 25th birthday.

He had been diagnosed with Leukemia almost three years ago, but I had no idea something could happen to him so suddenly. As far as I know, he had been doing fine. But the Friday before he died, he went to the hospital as something with his treatments had gone wrong and he was not doing well. And I guess he was just never able to pull back out of it.

I met Anthony and his twin brother Antoine in kindergarten. We were all in Mrs. Mugge’s class at Keysor Elementary. The twins were part of the desegregation program in St. Louis, which means they were inner-city kids who rode the bus to public schools in the suburbs everyday. All that to say, we weren’t hang-out-after-school friends, but I still remember sitting at the same table with them (we shared the end of the alphabet bond) using those big kindergarten-sized crayons, thinking they were so cool. The crayons AND the twins. He's the one on the left. I'm on the far right. Cute.

We went together through elementary and middle school as friends, but not great friends. I just saw one of our middle school teachers actually, who remembered that the twins always called me Tater Tot. They probably weren’t the only ones, but they were the loudest.

My sophomore year of high school is when Anthony and I became actual friends I would say, and not just kindergarten buddies. We started hanging out with some of the same people, and all of a sudden we were back to the days of sharing crayons at the big round tables. That summer we both went to Young Life camp, and after that, we were tight.

Yep that's Castaway. I miss those times.

Anthony was one of the nicest guys I knew, seriously. He didn’t care who you were really, he would say hi to anyone. He didn’t really see those lines of popularity, I think he just saw people. He could also always make me laugh. A lot. I specifically remember a good amount of time in high school that he was obsessed with the word bamboozled, and I thought it was the funniest thing every time he said that.

Let’s not forget he was bomb at basketball. The best player on the team our senior year. But my claim to fame was that I could still beat him and Antoine in a game of knock-out. Their dunking skills didn’t help as much there. I remember one of the reasons I decided not to go out for varsity basketball my junior year was because I had way too much fun being the boy’s team’s biggest fan.

We called him Deez. I don’t know where it came from, but that’s what I called him. And if I were to see him today, I think I would still call him that. He was a great friend. He was loyal. He was inspiring. I think one of the last times I saw him was my junior year of college when Loyola came to play UMKC in basketball. He was on the team and got my friend and me front row seats. I mean the place was less than a quarter full probably, but it was awesome. I remember sitting at that game and thinking how proud I was of little Anthony all grown up, and how thankful I was to have him as a friend.

Some of the best moments with the Deez came my senior year, when he and Chris Jackson and I had weights together. The two of them were my best friends in the class, so I was a little conflicted when we had to find spotting partners that were around the same size as us. Anthony was far from my size at about 6’8, but he and Chris and I still broke the rules half the time and formed a three-buddy system of spotting. It still makes me laugh thinking of the two of them standing over me while I bench pressed about 50 pounds, and then me being completely helpless when it was Anthony’s turn.

Yeah, he's not small.

When I found out about his death, one of the first things that came to my mind was a story I heard about a comment he made at Young Life camp once. He was in a cabin time, and their cabin was talking about believing in God. And he said something like, and please excuse the language, “I don’t know why you wouldn’t believe in God, heaven’s gonna be the shit.” Maybe not the exact words of the Bible, but he got the point.

I flew home for the funeral. It was a stressing debate of whether I should go, but I’m so glad I did. It was a quick weekend of a lot of emotion. Sadness in the fact that he is really gone finally hitting me, but joy in all the time I did get to spend with him.

The funeral service was half smiles and half crying I would say. The hardest part was when Antoine spoke. The two of them spent almost every day of their lives together, and I just barely have a glimpse of Antoine’s pain as he now has to go on in life without his best friend and brother here on earth. There’s sorrow in the death of someone so young, but even more so I realized that day, when a twin is left behind. So as you read this, I’d ask that you say a prayer for Antoine, as he will need the strength of God more than ever as he copes with the loss of his brother.

Anthony’s death brought people “out of the woodworks” as one of my friends said, and also united all kinds of different people. I took joy in the fact that I got to be there in person to give Antoine big hug and to reunite with several friends I have barely spoken to since high school. That was also hard because this wasn’t really the circumstance to have big catching up conversations, and I was in and out of St. Louis so fast I barely feel like I was there. But nonetheless, it was great to see Ellen, Rebecca, Chris Jackson, Antoine, Darrell Redmond, Jarriott Stubblefield, Vance Joseph Ivory Jr., Ben Woolf, Robbie Watkins, and several others.

As I was going to bed last night, I had the strongest feelings of missing high school I think I’ve ever had. And I think it’s because I really miss when those friendships were easy. When all you had to do to be friends with someone was show up to school in the morning. I miss sitting in the senior hallway at contact and talking to all those guys. I miss going to their basketball games. I miss throwing pennies at Jarriott and watching him pick them up as if he didn’t know we were throwing them (thanks for that memory Ellen). I miss hearing Anthony from halfway down the hallway yelling, “Tater Tot!”

So I think the biggest thing I take from all of this is that I want to make just a little more effort to keep in touch with those Kirkwood High School people.

I wish I had talked to Anthony more after high school. And I don’t really want to have that regret about anyone else. The further away from high school we get, the more I feel like those people are long lost family. Whenever I say I’m going home now, I really just think of my regular family. But when I saw all of those people today, I realized my family and my home in St. Louis extends far past Rochdale. There are people in and from St. Louis that I once cared deeply about, once laughed and joke around with, and once had great friendships with. And I don’t want that to just disappear as time goes on.

I find it interesting that we as humans are so quick to forget how much we cared about something when we’ve found something new to care about. Well, I’m just really glad that’s not how God operates.

So Deez, you will be greatly missed. I am so thankful that God placed you in my life almost 20 years ago at a big round table at Keysor Elementary. And I am so thankful that the friendship that started there never ended. So, in Antoine's words, "I'll see you when I get there."